Is there any consistent way of word tagging?

Hi
I've had a problem with consistent word tag insertion. My question is really a request for universal solution. I intend to put metadata into Lightroom, Adobe Acrobat and the like to organize my files better; at the same time I want to SEO optimise my new blog. I've experienced different behaviour of system and software search options, depending on how I write complex words (I'm not sure about Google for that matter). I also need this to optimise my Diigo bookmarking site.
Example: which is the best for SEO and and readability of ALL search engines?
1. behavioral patterns
2. behavioral_patterns
3. behavioral-patterns
4. behavioralpatterns.
Apart from that, some users argue that we shouldn't separate tags with a comma, using space instead.
All I need is a compromise between consistency and effectiveness. Please help!

Hi
I've had a problem with consistent word tag insertion. My question is really a request for universal solution. I intend to put metadata into Lightroom, Adobe Acrobat and the like to organize my files better; at the same time I want to SEO optimise my new blog. I've experienced different behaviour of system and software search options, depending on how I write complex words (I'm not sure about Google for that matter). I also need this to optimise my Diigo bookmarking site.
Example: which is the best for SEO and and readability of ALL search engines?
1. behavioral patterns
2. behavioral_patterns
3. behavioral-patterns
4. behavioralpatterns.
Apart from that, some users argue that we shouldn't separate tags with a comma, using space instead.
All I need is a compromise between consistency and effectiveness. Please help!

Metatags will not affect your rankings on any major SE's.
Option 1 is the correct option.
Option 2 would represent a single word (the underscore is treated as a character).
Options 3 & 4 would be the same as each-other as the dash is ignored.

But - as I said - Metatags will not affect your rankings on any major SE's.

@ClickyB

Originally Posted by ClickyB

Metatags will not affect your rankings on any major SE's.
Option 1 is the correct option.
Option 2 would represent a single word (the underscore is treated as a character).
Options 3 & 4 would be the same as each-other as the dash is ignored.

But - as I said - Metatags will not affect your rankings on any major SE's.

So, if I want to search through 'inner' SE's behavioral_patterns as a unity is the best choice, or nr. 1 anyway?
It's quite a surprise that it doesn't effect SEO...

ClickyB

It used to in the very early days ('90's) but was so abused that it was dropped from the algo's as soon as SE's developed a better way to identify kw's from within the site content / backlinks.

I only meant Adobe or Lightroom search options and their 'reactivity' to the way I tag things. Should I understand that the way I write word tags doesn't matter and they will be found? I tested it with Adobe and found out that , say, when I entered hans from hans_schmidt, I had no results - only the whole thing worked. So, it matters with 'inner' software search, doesn't it. I hope it's clear now

What is inner software search and how is it related to search engine optimisation?. Just wondering as you have posted in the 'search engine optimisation' section yet your question seems to be leading away from SEO.